Why parents get to say, "This hurts me more than it hurts you"

Friday evening. I'm dropping my daughter off at Colleen's house for a spur-of-the-moment sleepover. My daughter is thrilled beyond words to be spending the night at the home of a friend. I am thrilled beyond words that she possesses a friendship of sufficient quality and intimacy to have produced a bona fide slumber-party invite. My daughter, like me, does not friends easily make.

Colleen rushes out of the house and bounds down the porch steps, followed by her mother and her sister. I greet them on the sidewalk and thank the mother for according my daughter this exceptional treat, my daughter's fair face fairly illuminating the neighborhood with visible rays of joy.

The mother tells me, "Colleen was getting so desperate. She called just everybody, and none of her friends could come over. And then she thought, 'Hey! I'll call...'"

My precious child. The last resort.

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